


Before the Street Begins

by voltaires



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Marauders' Era, will add characters as they come up
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-12
Updated: 2017-11-26
Packaged: 2019-02-01 05:46:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12698592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voltaires/pseuds/voltaires
Summary: James Potter’s life is falling apart: his Quidditch team can’t seem to win a match, he’s hopelessly in love, and his only friends are entangled in a clone conspiracy.





	1. The Gravity of the Task which Lies Before Us

James had no memory of walking to the Great Hall.

He went through his motions mechanically, half-dazed and laden with sleep, buttering a slice of toast until it was soggy. He thought of the upcoming game with difficulty, for it was hard to see past his tiredness; their team had been preparing for months, and he hoped to bring them to victory in his first game as Captain. Yawning, James recalled the dream he’d had the previous night: the whole Slytherin team had upgraded their brooms and were using Paul Dierden’s head as a Quaffle. He hoped it was not some kind of horrific premonition, but then, Divination had never been his strong suit.

It was Sarah who drew him from these thoughts, cuffing him on the side of the head with the hand that was not waving a jam-covered roll around like it was a battle-axe.

“Oi!” she huffed, clearly put-out that James had not been hanging on to every word of her robust, pre-Quidditch speech, “Are you ready for the match?”

Odd dreams forgotten, James snatched the roll, tearing a chunk off with his teeth and grinning at her with a mouthful of food. She made a vague noise of protest, trying to reclaim her breakfast, and James held it out of her reach, saying, “When am I _not_ ready, Manning?”

“Last year,” said Sarah in a strained voice as she leaned over him to grasp the roll, “when your Comet started tailing left and you _said_ you would buy a new one-”

“Alright,” he said weakly, shoving the half-eaten roll back into her hand in an effort to quieten her.

“-and you cost us the match to Hufflepuff. _Hufflepuff_ , James!”

“Definitely one of his lower moments.” said a voice from behind them. James found himself shoved to the right as Sirius wedged himself in the small space between them, balancing a plate laden with food on his fingertips. A fried egg threatened to slide over the edge of the plate and onto James’s lap; he took the plate from Sirius before that could happen, allowing his best friend to settle on the bench.

“At least I’ve got the Nimbus now.” said James, claiming a slice of toast from Sirius’s plate.

“One match too late.” said Sarah solemnly with a dramatic, defeated hanging of her head. She righted herself at a sharp, accidental jab to her rib from Sirius’s elbow; she pushed him and James further down the bench and rubbed the sore spot. “Where’re Remus and Pete at?”

“They’ll be sleeping in until the match, the pillocks.” said Sirius, spearing a sausage on his fork and inspecting it carefully before laying it down and pushing the plate away.

James waved his slice of toast in Sirius’s face, saying, “Eat.” in a firm voice. Sirius made a whiny sort of noise, to which James said, “First match of the year. and I refuse to lose to _Slytherin_ because you fell off your broom in a fit of famine.”  
  
“Good morning!” greeted a pleasant, feminine voice far too chipper for an early Saturday. “How’re you all feeling?” Beth slid into the empty space opposite Sarah, a sullen-faced Lily right on her heels.

“We,” said Sirius, pointing to himself and Sarah, “are in excellent condition. It’s your brother we’re worried about.” He lowered his voice conspiratorially, leaning across the table to be closer to Beth but not at all concealing his voice from James: “It was totally his fault we lost last year.”

“It was not my fault!” protested James as Beth snickered behind her hand. “It was totally Davis’s, no one _told_ him to go flying in front of the hoops-”

“What’s got her knickers in a knot?” interjected Sarah with a sweeping gesture at Lily, who propped her chin on her hands and glared at a spot on the table. Beth gave a noncommittal shrug, taking a long drink from her goblet.

“Mornings,” said Lily, words laced with contempt, “are not for being awake. I’ve spent my valuable sleeping time breathing owl dung-!” At this, James snorted audibly, and Lily’s tired scowl turned on him. He hastily stuffed a second slice of toast into his mouth, unaware of what exactly he was doing, and rose loudly from the table, sending his own empty goblet clattering to the wooden surface.

“C’mon,” he said around the toast, seizing Sirius and Sarah by their shoulders. “There are some plays I want to go over-”

The three left the Great Hall, Sarah buttering a second roll as she walked. James was all too aware of several eyes following them, mostly sneering Slytherins who would not soon forget their crushing defeat the previous year. He waved in their direction cheerfully.

"Shouldn't we round up the others?" asked Sirius. "For the plays?"

James waited until they were in the corridor to answer. "That would be helpful," he said slowly; it was easier to pretend like he had forgotten about the rest of the team than to admit that he had gotten flustered by Lily and needed a quick escape. "Sarah, go back and get the team. We'll meet you on the pitch."

"Got it, Captain." said Sarah, saluting him mockingly.

"No more rolls!" called James as Sarah spun on her heel and returned to the Hall.

 

***

 

Beth was having a fine morning, despite Lily’s grumblings about how if Beth hadn’t insisted on them going to the Owlery before the Quidditch match, she might be in bed right now on one of the few days of relaxation they had left before the weather became unpleasantly chilly. Lily was usually not at her best any time before noon, but Beth hadn’t wanted to make the trek from Gryffindor Tower to the Owlery alone, and really, it was a perfect morning to be up early - the refreshing November breeze woke Beth up easily, but did nothing to wipe the sour expression off Lily’s face.  
  
She knew what she wanted to write in the letter: that she couldn’t wait to see her parents for Christmas, and the N.E.W.T. level classes were really challenging, but she thought she was learning a lot, and that she _did_ enjoy the solid gold set of Gobstones they had sent, even if she thought they were a bit much; she actually wrote the letter in the Owlery though. Lily stood over her shoulder and complained about how tired she was, to which Beth said that it would only take a few minutes to write the letter, while Lily suggested a few places that Beth could stick the letter.

Beth was in high spirits by the time they got to breakfast, seating herself across from James with Lily close behind. They didn’t have much time to talk — James excused himself rather loudly before Beth had even gotten done greeting her friends, practically dragging Sarah and Sirius behind him.

She swirled the contents of her goblet, side-eyeing Lily, who poked miserably at her breakfast. “You could at least _try_ to be nice to him,” said Beth.

Lily seemed to take a minute to process this. “I didn’t do anything,” she said finally. “I hardly looked in his direction. Besides,” she gave Beth a wry smile, “we’re not exactly on the best terms, are we? And we have no reason to be.”

“It was last year,” pressed Beth. “Besides, he feels really bad about it.”

“How do you figure that?”

“He told me.”

“ _No_ ,” said Lily in exaggerated disbelief, pressing a hand to her heart. “The Great and Swollen-Headed Potter-”

“Lily-”

“The Incredibly Thick-Skulled Potter-!”

“Lily!” said Beth again, though she was laughing now; pumpkin juice threatened to shoot out of her nose, but she would not have a repeat of third year.

“-Can admit that he has _feelings_? Feelings that aren’t about himself?” said Lily breathlessly. “It seems pigs have flown, and Professor McGonagall is in the running for the Wimbourne Wasps.”

“Oh, shut up.” said Beth from behind her hand where she stifled her giggles, hoping to keep her pumpkin juice down. “It’s been crazy over the summer, if you knew what he’d done back at home it would totally change your opinion-”

“Change my opinion?” said Lily. “How insulting of you to think that that’s possible. Are you done eating?”

Beth had pushed her plate away and risen from the bench, smoothing out her robes as she did. “The match’ll be starting soon,” she said. “I want to get good seats. Gryffindor’ll be doing their best to win - last year was just _embarrassing_.”

“You mean _James_ will be doing his best to win,” corrected Lily. “And hiding under his duvet for a week when everyone else doesn’t do the same.”

“Of course.” said Beth with a smile, deciding not to comment on the fact that Lily hadn’t referred to him by his last name, or that the sulk had nearly dropped from her round face. As they headed to the doors, Beth felt a wet cough force its way through her lungs. Her hand flew up in time to stop her from spraying the floor with phlegm - no, blood. Her eyes widened briefly, but she wiped her hand on her robes before Lily could notice.

“That sounded bad,” said Lily sympathetically, taking the lead through the corridor. Beth nodded, opting to ignore the cough in favor of the match. It wasn’t until they reached the entrance to the grounds and she was overcome by a fit of coughs, doubled over and dribbling blood onto the dark fabric of her robes, that she truly became concerned.

“Oi, watch it, girlie!” snapped a portrait in a tone that reminded her of Sarah as she leaned against it to regain her balance. Lily was by her side in an instant, helping her straighten up, brow furrowed.

“I’m fine,” said Beth before Lily could ask, wiping the corner of her mouth in case any blood had escaped. “Go on to the match, I’ll just pop into the Hospital Wing for a Pepperup.”

“Are you sure you’re alright?” asked Lily, concern clouding her green eyes. “I can walk you there-”

“Says the one who wouldn’t shut up about walking with me to the Owlery,” said Beth lightly with a flippant wave of her hand. “Go on, I’ll catch up.”

Lily looked unconvinced, but Beth raised her arms and cheered, “Gryffindor!” Lily smiled and said, “Well, if you’re sure…”

“I’m sure.” said Beth curtly. “I know you’d rather be out there watching Gryffindor play - well, _some_ of Gryffindor-”

Lily looked at her oddly, but maybe decided to take pity on her bad cough, for she didn’t argue. Instead, she said, “I’ll let you know how the match goes if you don’t make it.”

“Gryffindor!” cheered Beth again, pumping her arms in the air. Lily whooped loudly and gave her a thumbs up before heading out of the entrance; several portraits grumbled about the noise. Beth watched her leave, waiting until she was out of sight, hidden by the large stone doors, before heading in the opposite direction.

 

***

 

“Team,” said James, swelling himself up importantly, “I know last year was difficult.”

“‘Difficult’ doesn’t begin to cover it.” said Gregor McGregor, a fifth year with a face like a hawk. “It was pathetic. Humiliating. Tragic-”

“Save it for your Divination exams,” snapped Sirius.

“Thank you.” said James. “But we can make a comeback this year! We’ve got a great team - and I really am glad you joined as Seeker, Imogen, that Davis was really just-”

“Mortifying? Shameful?” supplied Gregor.

“I was going to say ‘subpar.’” said James. “But yes, I suppose.”

“Oi, stop using poor Davis as a scapegoat for your blunder.” said Sarah, sweeping at James’s trainers with her broom. “It was you who threw the Quaffle at his face.”

“An honest mistake.” said James. “Can I finish?”

“No.” said Sarah.

“Alright,” said James, turning to the rest of the team. “We’ve got a good shot at it this year, I know we do! Dierden, stay concentrated to the right, their best Chaser is left-handed. Sirius, flank whoever has the Quaffle, McGregor, keep your eye on the other team. Imogen,” he stooped to make eye contact with the newest addition to their team, “catch the Snitch. Their Seeker is good, it’s no use denying,” he said over Sirius’s loud groans, “but you’re better. Right!” He straightened up and clapped his hands together loudly. “Just go out there and do your best - no pressure, but if we don’t win, I’ll bury myself alive under the field.”

The stands roared as they left the locker room, though the Gryffindor spectators were loudest of all. “The Gryffindor team is coming out! Just like Chaser James Potter in fifth year!” said commentator Felix Dawkins, voice projecting over the field. James felt heat creep up his neck but he threw an exaggerated wink toward the commentator's podium. He heard McGonagall make an odd screech into the mic as she threatened to sack Felix from his position.

Such was the popularity of the sport, it seemed the whole school had turned up to watch the match. The weather was excellent for playing in, dry with hardly a cloud in the sky. James’s eyes swept the stands to search for his other friends; Remus and Peter were waving enthusiastically from the front row, though Remus looked a bit peaky.

“Perhaps the cheering’ll help the team forget your shoddy speech.” said Sirius to his right.

“I have such high hopes for this team, not even your pessimism can bring it down.” said James loudly enough for the rest of his team to hear. Madam Hooch stood at the center of the field, whistle to her lips. James strode forward to shake hands with the Slytherin team’s captain, a tall girl with an expression that looked like it had been frozen over.

“Try to keep the Quaffle in your hands this time.” she said out of the corner of her mouth as their gloved hands met.

"Is it hard to ride your broom when it’s stuck up your—?" James began, but was cut off by a shrill blast from Madam Hooch's whistle.

“Mount your brooms!” said Madam Hooch. James swung his leg over his broom as Felix said, “That’s what _he_ said!” to which McGonagall tried to wrench the microphone out of his hands for the second time before the match had even really begun. Out of his peripheral vision, James saw the rest of his team mimic his movements, straddling their brooms. With one more blow of Hooch’s whistle, the teams kicked off into the air.

 

*** 

 

Meanwhile, in the Ravenclaw stands, Cosima was wildly gesticulating as she tried to explain Quodpot to Alison; Alison herself earned the stares and hisses of several Ravenclaws, her green-trimmed robes prominent in a sea of blue.

“I know how Quodpot works,” said Alison impatiently, brushing her bangs out of her eyes as she searched the field for Sarah. “I just think it’s… unnecessarily violent.”

Cosima threw her hands up. “That’s the entire point! It’s the most American of all the sports. Where’s your patriotism, Ali?”

“It disappeared as soon as I realized that Quidditch, which is pretty much Quodpot without the explosions, exists.”

“Boo!” said Cosima, cupping her hands around her mouth to amplify the sound though they were sitting next to each other. “How boring is that? Am I right, Scott?” She nudged him with her shoulder.

Scott jumped a bit, having been more focused on the commentator’s podium than their conversation. He nodded absentmindedly, “Yeah, Cosima’s right. Don’t bother arguing, you’ll never win.”

A cheer erupted from the Gryffindor stands as Paul Dierden batted away Emma Vanity’s shot like it was no more than Peewee Quidditch.

“Dierden saves another goal, bringing Gryffindor one step closer to victory!” cried Felix into his mic. “I guess you could say … he’s a real Keeper.”

The whole school seemed to groan in unison. Cosima smacked her hand to her face, though she was snickering; Alison merely sighed in resignation to the awful joke. Gryffindor Chaser James Potter, who had the Quaffle tucked under his arm, paused mid-game to laugh at this. This only made the stands groan louder; some Gryffindors leaned out of their seats and threw their arms in the direction of the hoops, prompting James to continue the match.

Cosima and Alison followed the game intently, both cheering for Gryffindor; though Alison held a certain loyalty to her house, she held a closer loyalty to Sarah. James had been flanked by both of Slytherin’s Beaters, two burly, square-jawed boys who pressed in on his shooting range, and he had passed the Quaffle to Sarah; she aimed, launched-

“She scores!” said Felix, leaping out of his seat. “That’s my sister!” Alison and Cosima both laughed behind their hands; their laughter was cut off by the thwack of a Bludger hitting a bat with enough force for the sound to carry across the field. The two girls leaned forward to see what had happened.

“And that’s Black,” said Felix. He squinted over the field. “The Gryffindor Beater who’s just knocked Nott off his broom with a Bludger, that’s what you get for playing dirty, you rat - sorry, Professor, just telling it like it is! That was a well-aimed shot, what a player that boy is - I’ve been saying it for years, but he _still_ won’t go out with me.”

The stands creaked with laughter; Alison tried to look disapproving, but her lips twitched noticeably as Cosima wolf-whistled. Even McGonagall was failing to stifle her own laughter behind her hand. Said Gryffindor Beater abandoned the second Bludger he was pursuing to soar past the commentator’s podium and blow Felix a hearty kiss. Felix pretended to swoon, gripping his mic and flinging his arm over his face.

“Hey,” said Scott, nudging Cosima in the ribs and pointing to the commentator’s podium, which he had been watching rather bitterly. “What’s Pomfrey doing up there?”

Cosima and Alison both turned to follow his gesture; indeed, Madam Pomfrey was crouched between Felix and Professor McGonagall, hand shielding her mouth as she whispered something to the latter. McGonagall’s own mouth dropped out of its thin smile almost instantly. She rose from her seat, somehow more stone-faced than usual, and disappeared from sight behind the heads of raucous Gryffindor students as she made her way through the stands.

“Is she coming this way?” asked Cosima, craning her neck to follow McGonagall.

“Why would she be?” said Alison. “We haven’t done anything wrong … as of late, that is. Well,” she gave Cosima a pointed look, “ _I_ haven’t.”

McGonagall was, in fact, marching her way to the front row of the Ravenclaw stands. Scott scooted backward awkwardly to allow her to pass. She bent rigidly until she was at eye-level with Cosima and Alison, then said, in a low voice, “I think you both had better come with me.”

 

*** 

 

“Foul! That was deliberate!” roared Lily, shaking her fist at the Slytherin Beater who had just knocked Gryffindor’s Keeper, Paul Dierden, off of his broom and onto the sand below with a dull thud. Mary Macdonald tugged at her other arm, hissing at Lily to sit down. Dierden seemed unhurt but winded, and lay on the ground for a full thirty seconds, his broom hovering above him, before pushing himself back onto his feet.

Lily, focused on the game as she was, did not realize that Mary was trying to pull her aside to let Professor McGonagall pass. Momentarily distracted, Lily sat back onto the bench and wondered what McGonagall had left the commentator’s podium for; it was the prime spot for watching matches as it rose higher above the field than the stands. Her eyes followed McGonagall as the Professor made her way to the Ravenclaw stands, paused before Cosima and Alison, whom Beth was well acquainted with, and motioned for them to follow her. Thinking this odd, but assuming that they had just broken the rules somehow, she refocused her attention to the game.

Madam Hooch blew her whistle. “Foul! No attacks on the Keeper unless the Quaffle is within range! Penalty shot to Gryffindor!”

James seized the Quaffle and flew to the central circle, perpendicular to the opposing goalposts. The rest of the players cleared out a wide area, so it was just him facing the Slytherin Keeper, a rather weedy-looking seventh year. Lily held her breath as James sped forward, gloved hand gripping the Quaffle and aiming, he was mere feet from the boundary line—

Madam Hooch’s whistle blew again, the sound ringing over the field. James halted mid-flight, the momentum nearly throwing him from his broom.

“Time out!” she cried. “Potter and Manning, get down here!” She waved her hands vigorously, imploring them to land. Both teams looked confused; James and Sarah exchanged a look that clearly said ‘what did you do to get us in trouble?’ before descending. Sirius followed them, though he was not asked to.

Lily watched, somewhat anxiously, as Madam Hooch lowered her voice to address James and Sarah. The two exchanged another look, this one of worry, before dropping their brooms and sprinting toward the exit. Sirius attempted to follow, but Madam Hooch raised a hand to stop him and directed him back toward the game.

“What do you think’s going on?” asked Mary. “It’s going to be very difficult for Gryffindor to play with just one Chaser.”

Lily, however, was not listening; with a sinking feeling, she realized what all four of the recalled students had in common. Without a word, she rose from her own seat and edged around the knees of students, making her way to the Ravenclaw stands.

She approached Scott Smith, whom she knew to be a friend of Cosima’s, and sat down beside him; no one had filled the empty seats in Cosima’s and Alison’s absences. He looked surprised to see her.

“Do you know where they’ve gone?” asked Lily by way of introduction. Scott shook his head, relaying to her McGonagall’s ominous command. Lily rose again, gripping Scott’s arm, and said, “Shit, boy, we have to go,” tugging him out of his seat and dragging him behind her as she raced down the steps to exit the stands.

“Where are we going?” asked Scott, as Lily had not relinquished her hold on him even as they trekked back to the castle. Lily threw a furtive look over her shoulder at him, silently urging him to keep up both physically and mentally.

“I think it’s Beth.” she said eventually; their footsteps shifted from muffled thuds on the dirt path leading out of the Quidditch field to the hard slap of patent shoes on cobblestone as they reached the entrance to the castle. “She was sick this morning, coughing badly, and she went to the Hospital Wing. And now her brother and her - well, you know - have all been taken back up to the castle. I think something’s wrong.”

Scott still looked confused, but jogged to keep pace with her. “Madam Pomfrey can fix up coughs no problem, though. What could have gone wrong?”

Lily frowned, biting her cheek in thought, before saying, “I don’t know! You’re the Ravenclaw, you tell me! Besides, I think Beth was lying to me this morning,” she said darkly. “She was … way too cheerful. Which, you know, she always is, but … there’s no reason to be that pleased about a cough, you know?”

The Hospital Wing was on the first floor, so it was fairly easy for them to get to. They arrived just in time to see Rachel Duncan and a girl with unruly bleached hair, whom Lily had never met before, disappear behind the doors, which slammed shut and clicked behind them. Lily and Scott rushed to follow; there was an obstacle awaiting them, however, in the shape of Professor McGonagall, who would not let them through.

“There are already six visitors, Miss Evans.” said Professor McGonagall testily, laying a hand on Lily’s shoulder. “Please return to the match, or to your common room if you wish. That goes for you as well, Smith.”

“Please, Professor,” pleaded Lily, trying in vain to peer over McGonagall’s shoulder through the crack in the door. “Can you just tell us what’s wrong? Is she alright?”

“Yeah,” said Scott, though he still looked confused as to why he was there, “Beth is our friend, Professor, we just want to make sure she’s okay.”

Professor McGonagall’s lined face softened slightly. “She is doing well,” she said in a wavering voice. “There is no need for you two to worry, she is in Madam Pomfrey’s capable hands.”

She peered over her spectacles at them in turn. “I will be returning to the match. I implore you both to do the same.”

With that, McGonagall turned and started down the hall. Lily hesitated for only a second after she turned the corner before seizing the knobs of the double doors that led into the Hospital Wing and shoving them with great effort.

“Locked.” she said defeatedly. Scott watched on nervously as she drew her wand from the folds of her robes and aimed the tip at the doorknobs.

“I really think we should just head back,” he said, glancing around. “Professor McGonagall said we shouldn’t go in, she said she’s okay.”

“I’d like to see for myself, thanks,” said Lily firmly. “Alohomora!”

The doors did not budge.

“Maybe you didn’t do it right.” suggested Scott.

“There must be some other charm on it.” she said, rapping her knuckles on the large oak doors. From inside, Madam Pomfrey’s muffled voice called, “No visitors, please!”

With a loud groan, Lily sank into a sitting position on the cold marble floor; the sound reverberated off the stone walls and bounced back to them. Scott slumped against the doors.

“I take it you’re not going to give up that easily?” he asked, resigning himself to not going back for the rest of the match. Lily shook her head firmly. Scott watched, feeling embarrassed though he was not the one doing it, as Lily pressed her face to the floor to peer underneath the space between the door and the tile.

“It’s no use,” she said eventually, straightening up. “I can only see everyone’s shoes, and I think Pomfrey’s drawn the curtain.”

Scott shifted from foot to foot, spreading his hands apart as though weighing the options. “There’s nothing else we can do, then,” he shrugged. “It does Beth no good to just stand out here.”

“No,” said Lily, jaw set, “but I would be an awful friend if I didn’t wait here. And Beth is your friend too, Scott.”

Scott sighed, nodding in agreement. “You’re right.” he said at last, after several long minutes of silence. “I guess we’ll just wait here in silent protest until Pomfrey has to let us in … or something.”

Lily nodded in affirmation; the two sat on the floor, leaning against the heavy doors; the time passed in silence, the only things keeping them entertained were the gossipings of the portraits and the ticking of Scott’s watch. Lily learned, that day, that Countessa Julietta the Whimsical - though she should have, in Lily’s opinion, been called Countessa Julietta the Whingy - had taken a liking to the painting of the thirteenth century earl on the third floor corridor. She was too nervous to speak to him, though Lily encouraged her to; what did she have to lose, anyway? She was a painting.

Scott did not seem as interested by the portraits or their problems as Lily; at some point during their stake-out, he went to sleep, head lolling on his shoulder, emanating quiet snores as his shoulders rose and fell. Lily was still encompassed by a feeling of dread, but ignored it more easily as the minutes ticked on slowly; it was uncomfortable, she realized, sitting in one position on stone and wood; her back and pelvis ached and one of her legs felt as though it were being prodded by pins and needles. She was relieved, then, for the distraction of the students flooding back inside the castle as the match ended.

Several students broke from the crowd and jogged to the Hospital Wing: Sirius, Remus, Peter, and Felix. They skidded to a stop upon seeing Lily and the unconscious Scott. Perhaps they seemed to sense the tension within Lily, or perhaps she was exuding it through her very being, for the former three exchanged quick looks before speaking.

“The match went well,” said Sirius eventually, trying to lighten the mood.

“It didn’t.” said Remus flatly.

“As well as a game can go when one of the teams only has one Chaser.” said Peter.

“Gryffindor lost,” Remus informed her. “I won’t go into details, but it was awful.”

“At least I got to hit a few Slytherins,” said Sirius, miming swinging his bat. Peter, who had been standing in the way, got the full force of Sirius’s badly coordinated performance, and ended up being knocked on his face.

“Yes, the match was awful, Slytherin are a bunch of snakes,” said Felix impatiently. “What’s going on? Why’ve they got my sister in there?”

Lily rose to speak to him, bones aching from her extended wait; she resisted the urge to stretch and instead shook her head. “I don’t know,” she said. “We’ve been waiting here for ages, they won’t let us in because there are only six visitors allowed at once.”

“Ah, that dumb rule,” said Sirius.

Remus frowned at him. “You think every rule is a dumb rule.”

“It’s Beth,” said Lily, ignoring the tangent. “She got - er, sick this morning, but I didn’t think it was anything serious. And McGonagall said she’s okay, but I want to see for myself, you know? Otherwise why would they pull everyone off the field?”

“Well I, for one, am going to wait here to see what all this is about,” said Felix, crossing his arms over his chest as though he dared anyone to tell him to leave. Lily merely nodded, gesturing between herself and Scott, who had not moved from his spot.

“That’s what we’ve been doing.” she said. “But I’m starting to get really worried now, it’s been so long and no one’s come out yet…”

The initial crowd had thinned as students returned to their common rooms to discuss the match or complete homework, the Slytherins whooping about a party. One, however, made his way to the group congregated outside of the doors, a Head Boy badge pinned to the front of his Gryffindor robes.

“But we haven’t even done anything _wrong_ this time!” Felix whined.

“What are you all doing, hanging around here like this?” he asked, looking at each of them slowly. “Looks pretty suspicious, you know.”

“Hello, Articus Bell,” said Sirius, giving the Head Boy a winning smile.

Art fixed him with an even stare. “Don’t call me that. What’s going on?”

Lily sighed as the others looked to her to explain the situation. “It’s Beth,” she said. “She was sick this morning, and-”

Art looked at her with rapt attention, striding closer. “Beth’s sick? Is she okay?”

“We don’t know,” admitted Lily; his face fell. “That’s why we’re all waiting - Pomfrey won’t let anyone in.”

Art glanced over his shoulder; the corridor was clear of life other than their group and the occasional cat. He paused for a second before saying, “I’m supposed to be keeping an eye on the first years so they don’t get lost but… Beth is more important. I’ll leave that up to a prefect.”

He glanced briefly at Remus, who looked confused before remembering his own badge. “Right,” said Remus. “I’ll go … take care of that. Let me know if something happens.”

They watched him leave; Art turned back to the group and pointed at Scott.

“What’s up with him?”

“We’ve been here ages,” explained Lily, poking Scott in the leg with the toe of her shoe to wake him up. He groaned a little, cracking one eye open slowly and then scrambling to sit up straight as he realized Art was there.

“Is Beth out yet?” asked Scott around a yawn that he smothered behind his hand. Lily shook her head.

The minutes felt more like years; students filed past them on their way to dinner, chattering loudly, unaware of the creature of worry that had worked its way into Lily’s chest and settled there; it tightened her innards and stifled the rapid beating of her heart, which threatened to break through her ribcage as every silent second ticked on. No one said much of anything; like Lily had earlier, before she was consumed by unease, Sirius and Peter struck up conversations with the portraits; they proved to be more helpful to Countessa Julietta, reassuring her that she was, in fact, a lovely oil portrait and any earl would be lucky to mix paint with her. Art simply leaned against the wall, occasionally throwing a glance toward the doors to the Hospital Wing, which remained stubbornly shut. Lily felt hunger gnawing its way through her system alongside the creature of worry, but she could not bring herself to go to dinner on the off-chance that something significant would happen in her absence.

As if on cue, Professor McGonagall and the Headmaster, Professor Dumbledore, hurried toward their group, long robes swishing against the marble floor. Lily prepared herself to be scolded for loitering, but the teachers hardly paid them a glance; the doors swung open as soon as Professor Dumbledore had approached them; Lily whipped around to try to catch a glimpse inside, but the heavy doors slammed shut almost as soon as Professor McGonagall had slid through them.

“That can’t be good,” said Felix.

“No, it can’t,” agreed Art.

Lily did not say anything; she was afraid that opening her mouth would only result in vomit, nervous as she felt. The expression on McGonagall’s face, one of horror, of disbelief, one she had never seen on the most stoic teacher at Hogwarts, was telling enough: something was definitely wrong.

She did not have much time to worry about the specific scenarios the new information of a worried McGonagall brought; the steady, progressive silence was broken by the sound of trainers on marble sprinting toward their group.

Paul Dierden was looking much better than he had during the match, which wasn’t difficult considering he had fallen off his broom. He shouldered past Lily and Scott to try to tug the doors open; as everyone expected, they did not budge. He spun around to face them.

Lily, knowing what was coming, snapped, “We don’t know what’s going on, alright? We’ve been waiting here for hours.”

“Beth is my - my friend!” said Paul, clenching his jaw. “I have a right to know-”

“You and the rest of us,” said Felix testily. Art made a disparaging noise, eyebrows narrowing as he and Paul made eye contact. Before Paul could retaliate with a snarl, a strange, choked noise from inside the Hospital Wing drew their attention; seven heads swung in the direction of the sound, fully alert.

“What was that?” asked Peter uncertainly, hopping nervously from foot to foot.

“Shut up,” hissed Sirius; he had his ear pressed to the door, as did Lily, Art, and Felix. The others simply looked on, not wanting to be caught hearing something they were not supposed to.

The four leapt back as the doors opened at last, more slowly than before, creaking with effort. Lily gasped as she saw McGonagall’s face: if the worried expression had thrown her off earlier, it was nothing compared to how she felt at seeing McGonagall looking tearful, dabbing under her spectacles with a handkerchief.

“Professor McGonagall, what happened?” asked Art, sounding as though he did not really want the answer. Lily peeked over McGonagall’s shoulder, trying to form her own conclusion before the fact was indisputable; if Art dreaded something, then she was downright terrified of it.

Professor McGonagall sounded strangely heavy, voice laden with layers of sadness, disbelief, and the thickness that accompanied lumps in the throat. She turned her red-rimmed eyes on each of them slowly, stalling the news not out of cruelty, but out of a desire to protect them from sorrows that should not be experienced so early in life. In a low voice, with a bowed head, she finally delivered the blow.

“Beth is dead.”

 


	2. In This Solemn Hour

For a fraction of a second, though it felt like years, the world seemed to freeze as though in bated breath, waiting for McGonagall to break into an uncharacteristic smile and claim that it had been a joke. The moment did not come; Lily was acutely aware of her hands clenched into tight fists at her sides, fingernails digging crescent-shaped indents into her palms as she swayed on the spot, willing herself into disbelief.

Felix was the first to snap out of his shock, to push past McGonagall and walk through the doors, still cracked open. At the sight of movement in her periphery vision, Lily followed suit; McGonagall’s thin hand clasped around her upper arm, attempting to draw her back, but Lily shrugged out of the weak grip and slid between the crack. The whole thing felt almost surreal, like a warped dream too sharp to be imagined, as she approached the bed furthest from the doors, her feet like lead with every step.

It was a jarring image, five identical expressions of shock, of grief, tears spilling down five identical cheeks as they stared in different directions, not willing to look upon the sixth identical face, whose closed eyes tears would never fall from again.

Lily felt sick.

It was hard to picture Beth as she was this morning, cheerful and full of life; not now, while she lay still, a stark blanket drawn to her chin. She could have been sleeping, though it was well known to Lily that a sleeping Beth was a snoring Beth. Lily had complained about it on numerous occasions while Beth claimed she did no such thing but now, Lily would give anything to hear her snoring, to have some sign that this was an elaborate, cruel prank and Beth would reawaken any minute-

Lily didn’t know she was sobbing until she felt a pair of strong arms wrap around her, keeping her from sinking to the floor. Her hand had flown to her mouth to mask the sound and she leaned into Art, who seemed to be fighting his own sobs. She felt his breath hitching in his throat and he turned, unable to look at Beth.

Time seemed to move more slowly; tears took hours to slide over her fingers, her eyes moved like treacle as they scanned the room. Sarah and Felix clung to each other, looking more shocked than anything. Alison’s hands covered her own face while Cosima gripped her arm. By far the sight that jarred Lily the most was James.

His face seemed to reflect exactly how she felt; hazel eyes glassy with tears behind his glasses, seemingly unaware of Sirius’s arms wound around him for comfort as he fixated on the face of his sister.

So immersed in their grief, no one noticed Madam Pomfrey bustle into the corner of the Hospital Wing until she had arrived at Beth’s bedside and laid a hand on James’s forearm; she whispered something to him and patted his arm soothingly.

McGonagall’s voice, thick with emotion, spoke from behind Art and Lily: “We must ask that you all leave at this moment in order to-”

A cry of “No!” broke the still air, emanated from James as Madam Pomfrey attempted to gently tug him away from Beth’s side. Something seemed to break in him as he yanked his arm away and practically flung himself over Beth’s still form, clinging to her as though it would bring her back. Lily felt herself push out of Art’s embrace and cross the room swiftly, hot tears cooling on her cheeks as she did; James let the sobs wrack his body, his face buried in the crook of Beth’s neck. Sirius had grabbed him by the shoulders and was attempting to pull him off, but it was clear that he did not have the heart to.

Lily laid one hand on James’s back, the other finding its way to the hand that had wound itself through Beth’s hair; she laced their fingers together, stroking her thumb gently over the back of his hand. The space around them dissolved into nonexistence, the only sound that reached her ears was the sound of James’s sobbing, which slowly ebbed into jerky, shaking breaths.

It seemed to take an eternity to empty the Hospital Wing; McGonagall and Pomfrey were patient, gently coaxing the students outside; most were still in states of disbelief. The air seemed to still when everyone but James and Lily had been led out. Lily did not know how long they had been there for, but her neck ached, her palm was becoming increasingly sweaty against the back of James’s hand, and her heart did not feel any less heavy.

“Po - James,” she said quietly, her voice wavering. “We have to go.”

“I can’t,” came the muffled reply. “I can’t - I can’t leave her.”

“I know,” said Lily, dragging the heel of her free hand against her eyes to smear the dried tears away.

She unwove their hands and straightened up, guiding him slowly off the cot until they stood side by side looking at Beth, too many unsaid things hanging in the air between them and her; Lily felt the pressure of James’s hand sliding into hers again and together they tore their gaze away from the nightmare that never seemed to end, taking their first steps outside of the Hospital Wing and into a bleaker world.

 

***

 

England had a knack for behaving disagreeably; the weather was dreary most days, especially when it had no reason to be. It would only make sense for the sun to be out and the air to be dry today of all days, the one day Sarah welcomed the rain. The world, she believed, was not paying enough tribute to the tragedy that had befallen it.

She hardly noticed those who arrived, would probably have been ignorant of Headmaster Dumbledore’s presence if not for Alison’s whispering behind her. She would have been fine to stay shrouded in a mask of cold indifference, pushing herself into activity to ignore the fresh sting of Beth’s absence, but her friends would not let her. Fleamont and Euphemia’s eulogies were lost on her as she organized Quidditch plays in her mind, determined to keep tears behind her eyes, sadness behind her consciousness.

Sarah was jolted back to reality by her name being spoken by Dumbledore, who looked solemn as he folded his hands over the podium. Euphemia was being led back to her seat by her husband, her shoulders shaking visibly. Several heads turned to Sarah, who wanted nothing more than to sink below her seat and remain there for the rest of the ceremony.

Instead, she rose slowly after Felix’s hand found hers and gave a reassuring squeeze, leaden feet carrying her to the podium that stood beside Beth’s coffin. Resolutely looking anywhere but the cold wooden box, she climbed the few steps and laid her hands flat against the podium, trying to get her bearings. She searched the crowd, eyes sticking to the few people who had tears on their face, who broke the monotony of stiff mourning.

_She searched the crowd, eyes sticking to one face in particular; Beth cupped her hands around her mouth and whooped in support as Sarah dodged a Bludger. She kept trying to reassure herself that it was only a tryout, that there was nothing more at stake than her dignity. This only worsened the pit in her stomach, and she glanced again at Beth, who gave a thumbs-up and a wide grin._

_She nestled the Quaffle closer to her chest and sped toward the goal posts, taking aim and lobbing the large ball with all the strength she could: the first shot bounced off the rim of the hoop and drifted toward her; the second soared through._

“Beth was my friend,” said Sarah, swallowing dryly and clenching her hands on the podium.

_Beth’s cheer caught her off guard. Ducking her head, Sarah beamed to herself before regaining composure and flying after the Quaffle once more. She could almost feel the Captain’s growing annoyance with Beth as she shouted motivation to Sarah._

Sarah huffed something like a laugh between her teeth. “She’d hate me if I went all mushy right now… not really, though. I don’t think she had it in her to hate anyone.”

_She hadn’t made the team. Of course she hadn’t. There were Chasers from last year who were more experienced, had more skill, didn’t drop the Quaffle on their third try._

_It didn’t matter. That’s what she told herself. That’s what she told Beth._

_“It does matter,” Beth insisted. “You didn’t fail because you didn’t make the team. You just… have the chance to try again.”_

_Sarah pulled her pillow over her face and groaned into it. “I’m never trying out again. That was shite.”_

_She felt Beth flop beside her on the bed, ,felt the shift as she propped herself up on her elbows. “You only fail if you give up,” she said. “I’ll help you practice. You’ll try again next year.”_

“I guess that’s why no one could ever really hate her,” said Sarah, a painful lump rising in her throat. “I tried, though. I didn’t want friends — or I thought I didn’t. But she… I dunno… she made you like her just by being who she was. She didn’t quit — she didn’t believe in it, stubborn bitch.”

_“You don’t like Quidditch,” said Sarah. She hadn’t meant to sound as whiny as she did, but it came out that way._

_Beth’s elbows collapsed as she relaxed onto the bed, propping her chin on her folded arms. “I do like Quidditch,” she said. “I just suck at it. My brother can practice with you though.”_

_Sarah rolled her eyes behind the pillow, pressing it closer to her face; Beth’s determination to be friends with her rather than just roommates had been tolerable, maybe even welcomed, but right now, she just wanted to be alone and feel sorry for herself before finding something else to consume her time._

_“He didn’t make the team either,” said Beth conversationally, because she just couldn’t leave. “I think you’d like him. I also think you don’t really want to give up. You’ll do better next time.”_

“And once she wormed her way in there, she was more than just a friend,” said Sarah, biting into her lip hard enough to draw blood; she started at the coppery taste and pressed her fingers to her bottom lip.

_The cot was rough and the lights too bright; squinting against them, she saw Beth hovering over her, a wide smile plastered on her face._

_“Whu…?” said Sarah intelligently._

_“The good news is you’re alive,” said Beth. “The bad news is you got hit in the face with a Bludger.”_

_Sarah pressed two fingers to the crease above her upper lip and found it rough with dried blood. Her brow furrowed in confusion as she blinked slowly up at Beth._

_“The better news is that you only got a nosebleed out of it. Madame Pomfrey hardly did anything,” continued Beth, now perched on the edge of the cot and swinging her legs over the side. “But the best news is that you made the team!”_

_“I… what?” said Sarah, pushing herself up on her elbows. “I got hit in the face.”_

_“Yeah, but after you made three goals. You’re on the Quidditch team!” Beth beamed. “I told you you’d make it!”_

“She was my family,” said Sarah. And her voice definitely did not break on the word, she did not have to blink back tears that were threatening to spill hot and fast, but she rushed away from the podium anyway, her heart sinking lower and lower with every step away from Beth’s coffin.

 

***

  

She hadn’t caught most of Sarah’s speech; as hard as she tried to force herself to focus on the words, her eyes kept drifting to the cold, wooden box that, despite its warm mahogany, had none of the coziness that seemed to accompany Beth like a cloud.

Sarah had rushed away from the podium and Lily looked up, startled out of her trance. No one had gone to fill the empty space Sarah left behind; no one seemed sure of what to do at all, really. Lily felt herself rise, though it was almost as if it was another person, and she was watching herself take slow steps to the front, watching the blank expression on her own face; cynically, she almost heard the snide thoughts of attendees as they followed her: _How_ heartless _, she can’t even shed a tear for her best friend, how dreadful, awful, heartless._

Beth wouldn’t have wanted tears, Lily countered her own thoughts. In vain, because the voices of nameless faces were louder and had sunk their claws into her conscience, and she could not shake the feeling that she wasn’t doing enough, that Beth would have done more.

She didn’t realize she was at the podium until her knees knocked against the wood; she gripped the edge to keep herself upright and grounded, pointedly keeping her gaze lowered; she did not need to look into the judgemental, blurred faces, each one more mocking, more derisive, more haunting than the last.

Beth wouldn’t have shied from judgment; she would have laughed it off, the way she did with most things. But she would never laugh again, and her face was locked in that permanent, dull gaze, and if Lily didn’t think about something else, she was going to be sick. Her fingers dug into the podium, nails scratching at the dark paint; she bit her lip in thought.

“I know it sounds cliché, but Beth was… she was special,” she began, worrying her lip between her teeth. She found a cloud in the sky, hovering above the venue, and focused on it. “She always put on a brave face so no one else had to. She was… so selfless, she always put everyone else’s needs above her own,” she wiped her hand down her cheek, not caring that her makeup might have smudged.

_The city flashed past as Lily pressed her forehead to the window, feeling as though she might get a concussion from the shaking of the glass pane but not doing anything to stop it. Severus was talking, something about Tuney’s opinion not mattering, something that translated to Lily as muggles not mattering, though if she brought that up, he would immediately backtrack - no, that’s not what I said, Lily, just listen._

_The other three people in the compartment were largely silent, up until Severus began deifying Slytherin, and one of them, a dark-skinned boy with unruly hair, said, “Who wants to be in Slytherin? I think I’d leave, wouldn’t you?”_

_The second part was directed both to the boy across from him and the girl beside him; the girl shrugged, but the second boy, unsmiling, said, “My whole family have been in Slytherin.”_

_Severus looked smug; the first boy did not._

_“Blimey,” he said, seeming more shocked than he had any right to be. “And I thought you seemed all right!”_

She took a deep, shuddering breath, feeling the wind rattle her ribs and feeling far too breakable up here, bearing her emotions for everyone to see. “She stood up for what she believed in, even when it wasn’t popular,” she said, eyes still following the cloud as it drifted behind the treetops.

When the cloud was out of her view, she tore her gaze to the crowd and locked eyes with James; he immediately broke the contact, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. She looked at him closely, but he bowed his head, determinedly staring at the blades of grass beneath him. Vaguely, she wondered if he was trying not to cry.

_All hell broke loose from then. With the first boy’s declaration that he was destined for Gryffindor, Severus’s assertion that Slytherin was superior, and the second boy’s scathing remark that Severus couldn’t make it into either house, since he had neither the brains nor the brawn._

_She felt her face flush in anger as the first boy roared with laughter; the other girl had redirected her gaze from the window to the first boy’s face, her eyebrows narrowed, her mouth pulled into a taut frown._

Lily let her eyes drift further upward, blinking as slowly as she could. Someone in the crowd coughed, someone else shuffled, but she couldn’t bring herself to speed up.

“She wasn’t afraid of saying what she thought had to be said, or doing what she thought had to be done.” She scratched her nail deeper into the podium, feeling rooted to the spot. “Her morals were as strong as her courage.”

_She stood quickly, casting a derisive look toward the boys, and tugged Severus up by his sleeve. “Come on, Severus,” she said, in the most responsible tone she could muster, “let’s find another compartment.”_

_She spared a final glance backward toward the other three before leading Severus out of the compartment; they made it halfway through the train car, the boys’ jeers imitating her voice following until the door slid shut, before Lily felt a tap at her shoulder._

_She and Severus both turned, coming face to face with the girl from the compartment. She tucked her hair behind her ear, her gaze shifting between them both._

_“Sorry about that,” she said, eventually rolling her eyes. “My brother is the worst. He thinks he’s funny for some reason. Can I come sit with you?”_

It wasn’t fair, she decided, that in the grand scheme of things, the universe didn’t care who lived or died; she wanted to hold someone accountable, to wrap her hands around the neck of the galaxy and shake it until it either coughed up answers like meteors or destroyed the world in the process. It wasn’t fair that she would never have the chance to say the things that she needed to; but she said this now, in the hopes that it would seep through the wood and reach Beth’s ears; the only thing it earned her was the pitying look of a distant Potter relative, who dabbed delicately at her milky eyes with a charmed handkerchief.

For a moment; Lily could see Beth as she should have been in that face - allowed to grow old, to live the rest of the life that had been untimely stolen, sickness a modern Atropos, not caring how short the thread was as long as she got her pay.

_“Yeah,” she said. “I’m Lily.”_

 

***

 

Lily seemed dazed, bumping into the podium as she stepped off, brushing her fingers along the backs of chairs as she found her seat. Her legs knocked into James’s knees on her journey and they both looked at each other, bonded, if just for a moment, by the weight of the tragedy that dragged them down. He was drawn back by his father’s hand on the back of his neck, a warm, heavy presence that was equal parts reassuring and devastating.

He stood slowly, running a hand through his hair. His mother smoothed imaginary creases in his dress robes, squeezed his hand, and directed him toward the podium. The walk was infinite, yet didn’t feel long enough by the time he had reached it.

“Beth was,” he began, and found himself reeling.

_A fort of duvets pinned to the wall, James nicking their father’s wand and swishing it in the dark, golden lights bursting from the tip, illuminating the dark while Beth giggled behind her hand; the blanket was whipped away, their mother’s lined face peering through, her shadow looming from the sparks, a crooked smile adorning her features as she crawled in the fort to join them._

“I…” James shook his head, the lights bouncing off the backs of his eyelids as he did. “I mean, she was…”

_The morning of their letters - Beth gasping as she grabbed hers, James shoving her out of the way to get his own: Mr. J Potter, Potter Residence, Barnton…_

“Beth was my sister,” James began, tugging at the lapel of his robes, twisting the fabric between his fingers. “I… she was…”

_It was raining as they boarded the Hogwarts Express for the first time, weaving between adults hugging their children and weepy younger siblings, their trolleys used as scooters. Beth’s foot splashed into a puddle as she kicked off, drenching James’s trainers._

He felt his heart rise in his throat and he tried to swallow around the feeling, the frustration, the anger, but above all, the impalpable sadness, heightening every second he stood there. He focused on Sarah in the audience, knowing that if he didn’t think about it, he could pretend she was Beth.

_The door swung open sometime well past midnight; Beth ushered Sirius into their home, draping a blanket over his stiff shoulders as James stood frozen in the doorway. They shared a tired look, wondering how much more misfortune the world could bring._

A lot more, it seemed.

He took a deep breath that shook something in his bones, squeezing his eyes shut; in the crowd, Sarah was the ghost of Banquo, occupying a space that was not her own - but that wasn’t fair, it wasn’t her fault.

_Inhale. One, two, three, four. Exhale. One, two, three, four. Lights, letters, puddles, blankets. One, lights. Two, letters. Three, puddles. Four, blankets. One, Beth, two, Beth, three - one, two, three - one, two,_ fuck _._

“I can’t,” he said, suddenly. He shook his head quickly, eyes still shut, fingers tangling through his hair. “I can’t, I’m sorry, it’s not…”

In the periphery of his awareness, he was conscious of a hand on his arm, steadying him to his feet; he leaned heavily into Sirius, who, tight-lipped, led him away from the podium, away from Beth. He half-walked, half-stumbled back to his seat, the toes of his shoes digging up loose dirt.

The sun was setting beyond the treetops, casting a blazing orange glow over the field. In the upcoming darkness, Professor Dumbledore was the first to raise his lit wand toward the sky; the procession followed, briefly combating the thread of purple silk that fought through the sunset to emerge, and all was light.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one was a bit shorter. i think we should be updating weekly (every sunday) but it really depends on what's going on. thanks so much to everyone who is indulging our nonsense <3


	3. A Degree of Safe Sailings

_Several cold, metal objects prodded her mouth, her gums, scraping at her teeth; her eyelid was stretched open, gripped at the base of her eyelashes by cold, rubbery fingers; a thin pencil-light shone into her eye, tracking its miniscule movements._

_There was a faint beeping somewhere to her right. The blurry image of a tall man clad in stark hospital whites loomed over her; dizzy, her eyes slowly slid shut, the scene before her lost._

She jolted awake, heart thudding in her chest. Her hands clutched at her sheets, drawing them up to her chin and trying to regain her breath; looking around quickly, she snatched the mirror from her night-table and peered into it.

She was the same: her bangs, albeit a bit sweaty, were there; her eyes, wide and panicky, were there; the freckle on her right cheek was there. She was all right.

“Alison?” said a voice to her left. Alison jumped slightly, a gasp caught in her throat.

“Alison,” said the voice again, less patient. “Are you okay?”

She sighed and wiped a hand over her forehead, shifting the fringe plastered there. “I’m fine, Aynsley,” she said. “Did anything… happen last night? Like, did anyone come in here?”

It was hard not to feel Aynsley’s judgmental stare boring into her from the opposite side of the room.

“No,” she said dryly. “You’re sure you feel fine?”

“I feel great.” Alison smiled thinly, trying to look as chipper as possible. “Where’s Rach?”

“Breakfast. You’re a little late,” said Aynsley, smile equally thin. “I thought I’d wait for you.”

“That’s really nice of you, Aynsley.”

“No need to thank me.”

“I didn’t.” Alison smiled, sliding out of bed. “I’ll see you downstairs.”

She quickly pulled a robe over her pajamas and half-slid her feet into her shoes before Aynsley could respond and left the dorm; she exited the common room into the dungeon hallways and attempted to keep the panic which bubbled within her suppressed; the gates broke loose when she stumbled into Cosima, who was on her way to the Great Hall, in the first floor corridor.

“Cosima!” she whisper-screeched, digging her fingers into Cosima’s forearms and dragging her to a secluded area of the corridor, around the bend of the stairs. They huddled beneath the stone banister, Alison, still in her panic, leaving crescent-shaped indents on Cosima’s arms.

“Ow,” whined Cosima, rubbing the marks. “What’s going on, Ali?”

Alison dropped her voice to a low whisper. “There were doctors in my room last night! Like, real doctors with masks. Aynsley says they weren’t there, but I’m sure of it. They _operated_ on me, Cosima!”

Cosima snorted loudly; Alison glared at her, more agitated than anything.

“Sorry,” said Cosima, fighting a smile. “They _operated_ on you? Are you sure you didn’t-”

“No, I didn’t have a bad dream!”

“Alright, okay,” said Cosima, placating. “If you’re sure there were doctors in your room-”

“There were!”

“-then that’s not that surprising, right? We know that as, y’know, _clones_ -”

“Not the c-word!” begged Alison.

“-people would take an interest and want to, you know, study us.”

Alison paled considerably; she nervously wrung her hands and glanced over her shoulder, as though she expected a doctor to spring up from beneath the tile and cart her away.

“ _Study_ us?” she said. “What for?”

Cosima looked at her incredulously. “We’re, like, a biological miracle, Ali. They’d probably study our physiological functions, monitor our health-”

“Monitor?” Alison screeched, discretion out the window.

Cosima quietly urged her to lower her voice, using hand gestures more than words, and nodded fervently. “Monitor,” she confirmed. “Do you want to… tell the others about this over breakfast?”

“How about somewhere more private?” said Alison. “First floor girl’s toilet after?”

Cosima nodded curtly, and Alison looped her arm around Cosima’s elbow, and they walked as though they had nothing to hide into the Great Hall.

 

***

 

James poked at his fried egg, pushing it toward the center of his plate until it provoked the beans on his toast. He hadn’t had much of an appetite lately; he hadn’t felt much of anything lately, really, and was as content as he could be to spend Christmas break huddled in his dorm, talking to no one and doing nothing that would remind him of the reason his heart felt so hollow.

“Are you lot going home for the hols?” asked Sarah tentatively; he hated that - he could almost hear her quick glances in his direction, and could feel the hesitation in her voice, as if ‘home’ was a word that would send him spiraling.

“Yeah,” said Remus, equally careful. Peter nodded in agreement, mouth too full with muffin to properly answer.

“I _have_ to go home,” said Scott. “I’m not sure my mom’s been giving Denise her insulin shot properly.”

“Fe and I are staying here,” said Sarah. “S’s… Mum’s cooking is… it’s total rubbish.”

“Completely,” said Felix, edging into the space between Sarah and James. “That woman is so hopeless, not even magic could save her food.”

“Plus,” said Sarah, pausing to speak around the toast in her mouth. “Every Christmas Eve, she drags us to Bobby’s and forces us to sing shitty karaoke with her.”

“On _stage_ ,” added Felix. “You remember that one year with _Christmas Tears_?”

“Awful,” said Sarah.

“I’m staying here as well,” interjected Lily. “My sister, you know, she… she doesn’t really like magic, and every time I go home, we end up fighting.”

Alison made a small, sympathetic noise and placed her hands over Lily’s, which were folded on her lap. “My mom’s the same,” she said. “Which is why I’m staying, too.”

“Wow,” said Peter. “Everyone’s staying here. It’ll probably be more fun than Christmas at - ow!”

James looked up at the cry of pain, only to realize that Sirius had jabbed Peter’s side with his elbow while jerking his head quite unsubtly in James’s direction.

“Oh,” said Peter. “I didn’t mean-”

“It’s fine,” said James, short, running a hand through his hair. “ _Really_ ,” he insisted as his friends’ faces tightened with pity. He offered a slack smile. “In any case, I’d rather hang out with you losers at Christmas. Mum keeps trying to _smother_ me with knitted sweaters.”

“Same here,” said Cosima, pushing her glasses further up the bridge of her nose. “The hanging out with you guys part, not the sweater thing. I mean… we’re family. We have to stick together.”

“Merlin’s pants, Cos, it’s only eight in the morning.” said Felix.

“Hey, uh, after breakfast, do you guys want to hang in Myrtle’s room?” said Alison, looking pointedly between James and Felix.

“What?” said Sirius. “Where’s that?”

He and Lily glanced at each other, equally bewildered as most everyone else at the table nodded in unison.

 

***

 

“Where on _Earth_ could they all have gone together?” said Lily, hands clasped behind her back as she nervously paced the length of the rug in front of the fireplace. “This castle is big, but it’s not _that_ big.”

“Why didn’t they invite _us_?” said Sirius, sprawled across the couch, looking about as nettled as Lily felt, if not more. “Did we _do_ something?”

“Well, it _was_ rather rude of you to cut off Peter like that, you know James is feeling sensitive right now, you don’t have to be so _obvious_.”

“Excuse me?” said Sirius, sitting up quickly. “ _I’m_ not the one who was going on and on about my _tragic_ life as someone else has lost his sister. Oh, boo _hoo_ , your sister is _mean_ to you.”

“I wasn’t going _on_ and _on_!” said Lily, indignant; she realized, with growing horror, that she was standing with her hands on her hips, exactly as her own mother did when scolding. She quickly lowered her arms. “I was providing _reasoning_ for-”

“ _I was providing_ reasoning _for_ -” mocked Sirius in a nasally voice that sounded nothing like her own.

“For why I’m staying at the castle-”

“ _For why I’m staying at the castle_ -”

“You’re _insufferable_!” said Lily, and she did not stamp her foot like a five year old when she said it.

“Your shoulders are too wide for your head and you’re never going to be able to fix it,” said Sirius.

“At least I’m not a codependent _loser_ who’s so wrapped up in his best friend that he can’t remember where his own personality ends and James’s dick begins,” said Lily.

“At least my body doesn’t follow the same color palette as the Italian flag,” said Sirius.

“We’re _both_ in the same situation right now,” said Lily slowly, closing her eyes and breathing deeply through her nose. “We’re both being left out of something important.”

“You’re right,” said Sirius. “Much as I hate to admit it.” He rolled off the couch elegantly; Lily wondered, briefly, if Purebloods had tutors who specialized in making anything mundane look graceful.

“I know how we can find out where they are,” said Sirius. “But we’re going to have to break into James’s trunk, which is very uncool, and he might be mad about it.”

“Fine by me,” said Lily. “He’s _your_ boyfriend.”

They crept up to the boys’ dormitory; Lily couldn’t quite wrap her head around the purpose of their stealth - after all, it wasn’t possible for Sirius to break into a dorm that he himself lived in. Sirius cracked open the door slightly and peered in, then swung it open.

“What are you two still doing here?” he barked, striding immediately toward James’s bed; Remus and Peter looked up from their respective trunks, confused.

“We live here,” said Remus.

“We’re packing,” said Peter.

Lily stood awkwardly in the doorway, feeling incredibly out of place as Sirius popped the lock on James’s trunk and retrieved a folded parchment from inside.

“Not a word,” he said, pointing the parchment at the other two.

“Didn’t see it, don’t care.” said Remus.

“What is that?” asked Lily as they made their way downstairs and huddled in the corner of the common room that was obscured from view by the fireplace.

“Do you have eyes?” snapped Sirius. “It’s a map.”

“It is _not_!” said Lily. “It’s blank.”

Sirius pointed his wand at the center of the parchment, cleared his throat impressively, and recited: “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.”

Ink bloomed from the center outward, revealing what appeared to be a map of the castle. Lily leaned forward, intrigued.

“Where did you get this?” she asked, sounding awed despite herself.

“We made it,” said Sirius impatiently, scanning the map quickly. “Ah, there he is - and there are the rest of them. They’re hanging around without us… in the…”

“Why,” said Lily, deliberate, “are they in a _girl’s toilet_?”

 

***

 

“So you think you’re being monitored because Alison had a dream that some doctors operated on her?” said Felix. He looked unconvinced.

James hadn’t participated much in the conversation; he chose, instead, to listen, and to focus on the pools of water that gathered on the stone floor and dimly reflected the candlelight above. The girls’ bathroom on the first floor had been their recluse for all things clone-related; it was one of the most private areas of the castle - the ghost haunting it, Moaning Myrtle, wept so often and so heavily that she deterred all girls from using it.

“It wasn’t a dream!” said Alison.

“Listen,” said Cosima, placating. “Whether or not what happened to Alison was real - which I believe it was,” she included hastily as Alison opened her mouth to unleash another tirade, “I think it’s reasonable to assume we’re being studied: we’re scientific miracles, they’re probably doing some kind of twisted nature versus nurture experiment - produce some identical human subjects, study their choices.”

“So it would have to be people close to us, right?” said Sarah, swinging her legs from atop the sink. “‘Cause they’d have to be watching us pretty much all the time.”

Alison shuddered visibly. “We need to start thinking of the people we’re around often and deciding whether they’re trustworthy or not. Just between us,” she lowered her voice conspiratorially, “I think Aynsley might be in on it.”

“Aynsley Norris?” said James, looking up. “The Prefect?”

“She’s my roommate,” said Alison. “And she’s so _critical_ of me, and she didn’t even care when I said there could have been people in our room last night.”

“Well, it _would_ make sense for each of us to have a specific monitor,” said Cosima. “Someone uniquely close to us.”

“That’s definitely not creepy,” said Felix.

“Wait,” said James, suppressing the rising panic in his throat. “Hold on. If each of you has someone watching you, how are we supposed to know who we can trust?

Cosima smiled grimly, looking more pained than amused. “We can’t.”

“Well,” said James. “Well, yes, we can. We can trust Sirius, and Remus, and Peter, and Lily.” He ticked each one off his fingers.

“We don’t _know_ that, James,” said Sarah. “We’ve got to think hard about this - they _are_ around pretty much constantly.”

“And we don’t even really know them _that_ well,” said Alison, nervously wringing her hands. “Sarah’s right; we have to think about what’s best for our safety.”

“They’re our _friends_ ,” said James, looking between them disbelievingly. “You’re not buying this, are you, Cos? Felix?”

Felix shrugged, picking at his cuticles to avoid looking James in the eye. Cosima sighed heavily.

“We know they’re your friends, James,” she said gently. “They’re our friends, too. But-”

“But nothing,” said James. “I’d trust any of them with my life, and... and Beth would have, too.”

The bathroom fell silent; the only sound that could be heard was that of Myrtle quietly sobbing in the stall furthest from the door.

 

***

 

James slunk into the common room, Sarah on his heels. They quietly eased the portrait of the Fat Lady closed and slumped heavily against it. The room was so dark, he could hardly make out her features.

“Everyone’ll be at lunch, then boarding the trains to leave,” he said in a low voice. “Let’s just stick it out.”

“Right,” said Sarah. “The less questions, the better.”

There was a low click from the furthest corner of the room, and they were suddenly bathed in shallow light.

“Merlin’s fucking pants!” said James, squinting in the sudden light.

“We’ve been waiting, James,” said Sirius, lounging in an armchair. Lily was perched on the edge of her seat, hands folded neatly over her knees.

“You didn’t have to wait for me, you could’ve gone to lunch.”

“We weren’t waiting for you so we could go to lunch, you idiot,” snapped Lily. “We know you were all talking about something without us.”

“Yeah,” said Sarah, rolling her eyes. “Because it’s _private_ , you psychos.”

“It was… family business.” said James.

Sirius leapt up from the couch. “So _Alison Hendrix_ is more of your family than I am? Huh?”

“Oh, my God,” said Sarah.

“It’s not like that,” said James. “It’s just… okay, I really wish I could tell you, but I can’t unless everyone else is here, and it’s too complicated to explain otherwise.”

“No, it’s fine.” said Lily in a tone that suggested it was not fine at all. “It’s fine, we’ll just stay out of the loop.”

“It’s nothing about you!” said James. “If I wanted to talk shit about either of you, I’d do it to your faces.”

“That’s good to know. I’ll be applying that policy more often, then.” said Lily, and she stood and stomped up the steps to the girls’ dormitories.

Sarah rolled her eyes again. “I’ll talk to her.”

“Look, Sirius,” began James once they were alone in the common room.

“Don’t talk to me,” said Sirius. “Go talk to _Felix_ or _Alison_.”

“Fine,” said James, stung, and he turned to leave the common room. He made it halfway to the staircase before Sirius sprinted up beside him and skidded to a stop.

“You know I didn’t mean that, right?” said Sirius.

“Sure,” said James with a tired smile. “Yeah, I know.”

 

***

 

A week had passed since their meeting in the bathroom; the issue of monitors had largely faded from memory, or at least temporarily receded into its trenches, as Hogwarts had quickly emptied most of its population. The remaining students contributed their time to decorating their common rooms and tossing snowballs at each other in the courtyard. Being only one of two Slytherins who had remained at the castle for Christmas, Alison had roped Lily into her mission to decorate the Slytherin dungeon.

They stood in front of the fireplace, both angling their heads to best scrutinize the wreath Alison had conjured to hang over the mantle.

“I don’t know,” said Lily, cradling her chin. “I think the point is that the leaves _aren’t_ supposed to be dead.”

“Fish sticks,” said Alison, dropping her wand on the couch behind her. “This would be so much easier if some of my housemates had any interest in helping me. It’s just so… _gloomy_ in here, you know? I mean, we’re under a lake and all, but that doesn’t mean we have to live like… like we’re in a cave!”

“Maybe that’s the motif they’re going for,” suggested Lily. “Keep it slimy to ward off mudbloods and all that.”

“I wouldn’t doubt it,” said Alison, slumping onto the couch. “All my housemates _hate_ me. That’s probably why none of them stayed here for Christmas. Well, almost none of them.”

“Who else stayed?”

“Severus,” groaned Alison, burying her face in her palms. “You probably shouldn’t even be here, he might slither out and start apologizing again.”

Lily felt a sense of dread creeping through her as she pondered the idea of facing Severus again; it was like an open wound, the fact that she had wasted so many years, turned away so many friends, to stick by his side, and he had thrown it back in her face, practically admitting that she was worth less to him than his future Death Eater friends.

“You’re right,” she said, no longer wanting to pretend to be in a cheery mood. “Look, can we work on this tomorrow? It’s kind of late.”

“Fudge, it’s almost eleven!” said Alison, glancing at her watch. “Yes, yes, go to bed!” She gently shooed Lily out of the Slytherin common room, whispering a quick ‘goodnight’ before the stone wall slid shut.

Lily stood alone in the dark, damp corridor, crossing her arms over her chest as she made her way toward the stairs. Everything about the dungeon was off-putting, from the moss that grew beneath the cracks in the floor, to the draft that blew from behind her. She wondered how anyone could stand to live in such a place for seven years, and why Slytherins didn’t just transfer to Beauxbatons.

Hogwarts was still at night; during the day, the castle bustled with activity: the portraits jeered, the staircases shifted, the Quidditch players practiced. At night, it was as if Hogwarts had been shut down. The quickest moving things were the clouds in the sky, and she could see them from the window by her bed. She lay on her side for a while, counting the trees she could see from her window, then counting the number of clouds that looked like an object, then trying to count the stars and eventually giving up.

It was past midnight and she could not force her eyes to stay closed any longer, so she swung her legs over the bed, found her slippers, put on her robe, and left the room. Lily wandered aimlessly through the castle, only her dimly lit wand guiding her, until she found herself at the Great Hall.

The stairs that led to the Hufflepuff basement had always intrigued her; they emanated a warm, yellow glow that drew her nearer, until she was descending them. Underneath the Great Hall was just as warm as the stairs: the light wood of the floor homed a cozy discoloration that led her to a large portrait of fruit.

Stretching her hand out to touch the canvas as high as she could reach, she brushed her hand over the apple, the grapes, and the pair. The last fruit giggled, she gasped, and it transformed into a green gilded door knob, slotted directly into her hand.

“Weird,” Lily whispered, though she had seen weirder.

She swung open the door and found herself facing… a kitchen. Feeling deflated, she noted that it was not an unimpressive kitchen by any means - the ceilings were as high as those of the Great Hall above, brass cookware hung from the ceiling like contemporary windchimes. She scanned the room, not realizing that she was intruding until her eyes swept the floor and met dozens of pairs of shining, tennis-ball sized eyes blinking up at her in worry.

“Oh,” she said, surprised. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean-”

“Evans?” said a familiar voice. She groaned inwardly.

“What are you doing down here?” asked James, rising from the short stool he had been perched on.

“I could ask you the same thing,” she said.

He was silent for a moment as he rummaged through several cabinets before retrieving two mugs and setting them on the countertop; he waved away several house elves as they insisted on aiding his endeavor to make hot cocoa for each of them. Surprised, Lily accepted her mug, fingertips tingling with its warmth.

Lily perched herself on the countertop, resting her elbows on her thighs and cradling her hot cocoa; James slumped easily into the low stool again. They sat in the stillness of the night, devoid of sound save for the occasional offering of a pastry by a house elf, or the gentle chimes of the brass pots above.

“Every Christmas when we were kids,” said James suddenly, breaking the easy calm that had settled over the kitchen, “Beth and I would get up as soon as the sun did, and we’d run to Mum and Dad’s room and jump on them until they woke up.”

Lily smiled sadly into her mug. “I bet they loved that.”

“They did, actually,” said James with a quiet laugh. “We’d all decorate the tree together, but we always waited until two nights before to actually get started. Beth and I constantly fought over who got to put the star on top - until I got taller than her and could reach it without Dad lifting me.”

He was clutching his mug so tightly that his knuckles had paled. Lily realized, with a sharp pang to her stomach, that he was trying not to cry.

“It’s just… I can’t be at home right now,” he said, voice strained. “I can’t do it - I don’t want to wake up on Christmas and have her not be there, because then it’ll be _real_ and she’ll be gone.”

“I know,” said Lily.

“And I feel especially awful because I _know_ Mum and Dad need me to be at home right now, but I can’t. And I can’t deal with the extended family and all their sympathy, like ‘her body is gone, but not her soul.’ What does that even fucking _mean_?”

“I know,” she said again, sliding off the countertop and kneeling in front of the stool. She placed her hand over his, slowly prying the mug from his grip. “I know it hurts. And it’s going to hurt for a long time. I don’t even want to get up in the morning because I can see her bed and I know that she should be in it.”

She placed both mugs on the ground and grabbed his hands, looking him straight in the face. “Look, I know we haven’t been the nicest to each other, but I’m _here_ for you. Stop concerning yourself with what everyone else needs from you. Be _selfish_ for a little bit, Potter. Get angry, get upset, scream at the universe for as long as you need to - the _last_ thing she would have wanted is for you to keep it all locked up for the sake of others.”

She saw the faint trace of a smile etching itself over his features. “You’re alright, Evans,” he said.

“How often do you come down here?”

“Only when I can’t sleep,” he said. “Which has been a lot, lately. Might need to find a new spot if you’re going to keep hanging around.” He quirked a real smile, teeth and all, at her.

“Get used to it,” she said, gently knocking him on the knee with a loosely-wrapped fist.

“Hey, uh,” said James, looking slightly awkward hunched down in the stool, “I’m sorry about earlier this week. With the bathroom and all.”

“It’s completely fine,” said Lily, sincere. “I was being dumb, it’s your privacy. I shouldn’t have kept on about it.”

“No, it’s…” said James. “Look, it’s just kind of a difficult thing to say out loud because you might think I’m making it all up, but you deserve to know because you were Beth’s best friend and… just don’t laugh, alright?”

“Why would I laugh?” said Lily, sitting up straight. “You really don’t have to tell me if you don’t want-”

“No, I want to,” said James. “It’s just… look, they’re genetic identicals. They’re not, like, sextuplets or however many there are. Sarah, Beth, Alison, Cosima - they’re all the same.”

Lily paused. “Genetic identicals?”

“I don’t really understand it all myself,” he admitted. “But Cosima kind of figured it out through some samples; she said that they were created in a lab and inserted into surrogates; Beth was adopted by Mum and Dad, so they had no way of knowing this-”

“So they’re clones?” interrupted Lily. “Lots of muggle scientists have been talking about human cloning, but I didn’t think anyone had actually _done_ it yet.”

“Yeah,” said James, looking fairly relieved that she had taken him seriously. “They’re clones, I guess. And Alison brought up that they might be under watch by whoever cloned them, and it really freaked her out because we don’t really know who’s watching who.”

“What?” said Lily. “That’s a total invasion!”

James nodded fervently. “We’re trying to come up with a plan to figure out who’s monitoring who, but we’ve come up blank.”

“You’re thinking too hard,” said Lily. “You need to relax; give your brain time to wind down and return to the problem the next day. You know what,” she stood up suddenly. “We’re all going to have fun if it kills me.”

 

***

 

He had to hand it to Lily: she was not one to go back on her word. Immediately after the next night’s dinner in the Great Hall - made less Great by the fact that the long benches had been pushed against the wall and the room now featured a single standard sized dining table for remaining staff and students - she cornered them all and proposed her idea of a fun night.

“Gobstones?” said Felix, unimpressed. “You want us to sit in the Gryffindor common room and play Gobstones?”

“It doesn’t just have to be one game,” she said. “We could play Exploding Snap, or Wizarding Chess, or-”

“Listen, Lil, you’ve set us on the right course,” said Sarah. “But I think there are better ways to have fun than _that_.”

“Nothing illegal,” said Alison warningly.

“I have an idea,” said James. “I don’t _think_ it’s illegal, but we’d do better without being caught.”

“Oh, c’mon,” said Sirius, fairly peeved. “You’re going to show them the tunnels, too?”

The secret passages that veined the ground beneath Hogwarts were, in James’s opinion, one of the castle’s finest features. So far, they had documented six on their Map and were in the process of searching for others; it was Sirius who had discovered the statue of the one-eyed witch adjacent to the stairs that led to the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. It had taken a while to discern the spell needed to reveal the pathway, but they had gotten it eventually: one simply needed to tap the hump of the statue with their wand while casting the Dissendium charm, and the statue would slide open just enough for one person to slide down to the hidden passageway at a time.

“How did you find this?” said Cosima in awe, not paying much attention to the muddy ground beneath her feet or the damp walls of the tunnel.

“We get around,” said Sirius.

“Where does this lead?” asked Felix, winding the arm not holding his illuminated wand around Sarah’s elbow and sticking to her tightly.

“Honeydukes’s cellar,” said James, who was crouched over to fit in the tunnel, matter-of-factly. “From there, we have free roam of Hogsmeade. Which, I know, _pales_ in comparison to a night of Gobstones-”

“Shut up,” said Lily, though she looked amused.

James stopped abruptly and put a finger to his lips before pressing his ear to the cellar door above. When he had decided that the cellar above was quiet enough, he pushed the wooden door open and pulled himself up through the opening, offering a hand below to the others who weren’t quite tall enough to reach.

They crept quietly through Honeydukes, long-since closed at 11 P.M. James winced as the bell above the door tinkled quietly when he opened it, and held the door while ushering everybody out to prevent further noise.

Hogsmeade was impressive in the winter: a little picturesque village, fresh snow piled atop the sloping roofs, the orange light of the streetlamps glowing warmly above the plowed road.

Alison shivered and pulled her hat lower over her ears. “I can’t believe it’s colder here than in Toronto,” she said, stuffing her mitten-clad hands into her pockets.

“Let’s head to the Three Broomsticks,” said Felix, rubbing his hands together furiously. “I’d die for a Butterbeer.”

The pub was still open, and was fairly crowded for a holiday evening. They managed to snag a booth near the back and were practically on top of each other in an effort to sit comfortably. The pub was quite crowded for Christmas; assorted loners were strewn about, nursing their drinks, likely avoiding the bleak solitude of their homes. Rosmerta, however, had never looked less busy, and served their drinks almost as soon as they had sat down.

James sat back in the booth, sipping his Butterbeer and silently watching his friends, he felt more at peace than he had in weeks. The atmosphere of the pub was warm and dimly lit with orange lights, though snow continued to pile up outside. The various conversations around him piled up: Cosima, in a flurry of wild gestures, was trying to explain some concept beyond anybody else’s scope of reasoning to Sarah; Felix and Alison snickered behind their mugs at a joke nobody else would be let in on; Lily teased Sirius about something or other, poking him in the ribs while he swatted her hands; Sarah finished her Butterbeer and waved Rosmerta over for another while Alison, ever the concerned friend, tried to yank her arm down. James realized, with a start, that he was beginning to be alright looking Sarah, Cosima, and Alison in the face again.

Though they were not Beth, they were extensions of his family. Not just the three, but all of them: Lily, and Sirius, and Scott, and Remus, and Felix - all appurtenances of his life, all people he could depend on. Not replacements for Beth - no, she could never be replaced, and he would never try to - but a category in their own right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always, don't take this too seriously. it's mostly inside jokes and inside angst. sorry for the shitty writing, i dropped the ball this chapter a bit.

**Author's Note:**

> this is a fic i've been writing with my best friend (captainsclone.tumblr.com) for... so long now. it's actually two years in the making, most of which has been us fucking around on a planning doc (may be in an art museum some day). it's basically one big inside joke that we thoroughly enjoy and take seriously despite ourselves. 
> 
> and just to clarify, james and beth are adoptive siblings.


End file.
